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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 20, 2026

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Interesting observations, and definitely a lot of food for thought and merit here. I should say though, I mean, I spend every minute of every day (that I'm not on the motte) surrounded by leftists. While you are right about leftists' take on the morality of racism and sexism-adjacent activities, leftists in real life do not generally have this unhinged need for people to be absolutely correctable about benign details all the time. That's really just a reddit thing, and I'd attribute it more to the psychology of road rage; that you can't see the face of the person you're talking to. And I think that the reason modern politics sucks so damn much might also have to do with that.

Besides that, I basically agree with @newcomputerwhodis. And I'm really really good at being self-reflective in my life when it matters. At work I'm the most apologetic, willing to adapt and take criticism person, that most people have ever met, and I think that largely explains why everyone likes me at work and likes working with me, and also explains pretty much all of my promotions. I do that at work because I'm sort of creating a persona at work. We all do this in compartmented parts of our lives. I do this especially because I'm terrified of being fired because I need my job to support my family. But that really takes a toll on me. I can't keep that up when it doesn't matter, and certainly not for randos who aren't actually helpful, and seem to mostly want to assert dominance or otherwise just pick a fight. Online when there are people who are helping me in some way, I go right back to being the persona I am at work, though.